Dare to Give Handmade

It's the 3rd week of Dare to DIY and this week is the Dare to Give Homemade challenge hosted by Decor and the Dog, Maybe Matilda, Newly Woodwards, and Two Twenty One!

I really tried to get my handmade gift done in time for this, but I'm still a bit behind.  I'm going to show what I've done at this point so you can see where I am going with it.

I decided when my husband and I got married almost three years ago that I wanted to make Christmas stockings for us.  As a child, my mom made homemade stockings for all of us, so I never had 'store bought' Christmas stockings.  Now don't get me wrong, there are some suuuuuper cute ones out there, but I wanted to carry on the tradition my mom started with making homemade stockings. The plan is to make the two stockings for us now, and should little ones appear over the next few years I will make stockings for them too!

So this gift is kind of for me, but kind of also for my husband, and a someday gift for our possible future kiddos.

Here is what I have so far...

...an almost completed pile of stockings.

The red stocking is nearly finished.  I just need to tack in the liner and stitch on the buttons.  I used this pattern from Berroco which I found on Ravelry.

 

Speaking of buttons -how cute are these?  My Nana saved buttons off of everything and had jars and jars of them.  My mom now has most of them and whenever I need buttons for something, I go digging.  Some of them are really old, some a bit newer, but I love the idea of reusing buttons and giving them a new purpose.  It also helps that older buttons are really cute and fun!

The original stocking didn't call for a lining.  I ended up using an acrylic/wool blend yarn and the stocking is REALLY stretching.  Awesome for over-stuffing, but not so awesome overtime.  I want the stockings to last, so I picked up this cute fabric at Joann's to line both stockings.

 Here is the grey stocking in progress.  I am nearly there!  I should have them both done by this weekend and will post some pictures of them in their rightful place hanging in our living room.

Again, how cute are these red buttons!

Stockings are pretty much my favorite part of Christmas morning.  Finding all the little trinkets and candy (and toothbrushes) was something we all looked forward to.  It is a tradition that I love continuing with my husband.  Now I just need to finish them up in time to be filled by Santa :)

Birthday Surprise!

So the plan this weekend was to enjoy a night out with two of our dear friends that recently had a baby.  My husband got the day off from work and I was really excited about a chance to catch up with our friends.

As I started getting ready, my husband gently suggested we dress up for dinner.  We were going to a restaurant we hadn't been to before with friends that hadn't had a night out in a while, so I went with it.  We don't dress up much on the weekends so it was a nice treat.

We left early and made a stop at a shop on the way for some Christmas shopping and then headed to our friends' in the early afternoon.  We hung out with them and their daughter for a few hours...their baby sitter arrived and the 4 of us carpooled to dinner.

When we arrived to the restaurant, it was freezing out.  I was so focused on the cold, I never even looked into the huge windows at the front of the restaurant...well if I had....

I would have seen a wonderful group of friends and family waiting for me to celebrate my 30th birthday!  I turned the corner in the restaurant and there they all were, smiling and laughing.

It was such a wonderful surprise and I tried so hard not to cry, but a few tears fell...

I'm a Christmas baby.  It's one of those birthdays that when anyone finds out they always think it must be terrible!  But it never was!  I always had a wonderful birthday as a kid.  My parents never 'forgot' my birthday....they always made it a very special day for me.

It did however make it hard to have birthday parties on or even near my birthday!  December is a busy month for everyone, so as a kid I often had half birthday parties in the summer!  Having this party now was perfect.  It was early enough that most people could make it, but it was still my birthday month. 

Christmas is probably my favorite holiday and I love that I get to celebrate and share my birthday with family and friends every year!  Not many people can say that as they get older, they still get to celebrate their birthday with family and friends every year.

I am so blessed - not just with a great birthday, but with a wonderful life full of amazing people.  I have friends that I consider family and family that are my bestest of friends.  When I saw all those smiling faces at the restaurant, I was overwhelmed by the love I have in my life!

My husband did good!  I had mentioned to him that I might want to do something for my birthday this year since 30 seems like kind of a big deal (heehee)  But money has been tight and I know the holidays get crazy, so I stopped thinking about it.

But he didn't!  He got in contact with friends and family and got them on board to help him make this happen for me.  One of my friends even found a groupon that helped them decide on a restaurant!  Thank you groupon!

And thank you my husband, family and friends.  I know I have said it over and over again in this blog, but I am SOOOOOOO lucky to have the people in my life that I do!  They do so much for me, and I hope I am able to give them as much!

Back to the real world tomorrow, but with wonderful memories of an amazing birthday surprise...

Dare to Entertain

It's the 2nd week of Dare to DIY and this week is the Dare to Entertain challenge hosted by Decor and the Dog, Maybe Matilda, Newly Woodwards, and Two Twenty One!

I have a tiny kitchen, which also acts as a dining room for us.  We don't really have a good space for a dining table at this point.  But we have a cute little red enamel table that I think goes great in our old home.

I decided to set up an intimate table setting for just the two of us.  I wanted to make a cute centerpiece, but didn't want to spend a lot of money.  I had a bunch of leftover flowers from my first DIY and a few other "fall things" lying around, so I created a fall-ish table setting with centerpiece.

The centerpiece is glued to a foam placemat I bought forever ago that ended up being too big for our table.  I cut it down and then hot glued all the parts and pieces together.

I also didn't have a great tablecloth or runner....so I used a throw blanket that was the perfect color.  The dishes are our everyday fiestaware and a quick ribbon around napkins and I was done.

We don't often 'dress up' the table so after I photographed everything, we had dinner with the set up and it really was quite nice.  I should do this more often.

I may have another table set up during this DIY...I have plans for a Christmas table, but have not finished all the pieces, so stay tuned.

Definitely check out all the other AMAZING table settings that are part of Dare to DIY - they are incredible!

Dare to...be Thankful!

So it's the first piece of the Dare to DIY link party I decided to try this year.


I’m sharing this at the Dare to DIY party hosted by Newly Woodwards, Decor and the Dog, Maybe Matilda, and Two Twenty One!

For my be thankful project, I decided to create a decoration to hang on my front door. We moved into the house last year during the October snowstorm and it took us a bit to get settled. This year is really the first year that we get to decorate for the holidays!

I received a lovely hanging basket as a house warming gift and had yet to use it. I figured it would work perfectly for my front door hanger. Every time I look it I think of who gave it to me, my dear sister, and what it stands for, our family and our new house!

I am so thankful for my family and my home this year, and every time I look at my front door Ian reminded of these things!

Here are a few pictures of the finished product. My camera is currently mia so bare with the iPad pics!

Dare to DIY

So I'm attempting to join my first link party.  I'm hoping this will help me connect with more blogs AND to get me CREATING.  I've been in a bit of a rut, and what better time than the holidays to get inspired.

I'm joining Dare to DIY hosted by Newly Woodwards.  It is a lovely blog.  Although we have never met...and I'm not a super active blogger (yet), I feel like if we met, we would be great friends.

Wish me luck!  It's starts soon!

Halloween Musings

As I sit here, getting ready to watch "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown," I realize it has been quite an October.  Lots of planning for Halloween only to have to take most of it down before Hurricane Sandy came through.  We were lucky and I was able to re-decorate a bit...but really so lucky - many people got it much much worse.

We also moved into our new home on Halloween last year.  It's crazy to me that we have already lived here a whole year in our own home.  We've been busy making it our own:

  This is the set up after the storm.  I created MANY more gravestones, but wanted to set up less the second time around.  Here are a few more pics of the finished cemetary:

  

I was also busy with some indoor decorations.  We bought one of those glowing eyes that make noise that you hide in the bushes.  Well, we did something a little different with it:

And here it is in action:

As for costumes.  I found this "lovely" rose colored bridesmaid dress at the Salvation Army that totally fit like it was made for me....so I destroyed it and destroyed one of my husbands old suits to create "Ghoul Prom King and Queen"

Here are the pieces:

And a few sad pics of us in costume.  I totally got so wrapped up in the party that I didn't take many pictures:

And the cheesy "Prom" pic:

We had a great party and another successful Halloween despite the weather.  I hope everyone had a good holiday and are healthy and safe...and those of you that felt the wrath of Hurricane Sandy, you are in our thoughts and prayers!

Happy Haunting

So the weather here in New England has not been real conducive to outdoor crafting. I had BIG plans to get some Halloween decorations made...and I did get some done...but not nearly as much as I would have liked.  Foam grave stones are so much easier to carve and sand outside, so I only started them, hoping to get them done during the week.

...and then it rained like every day....

But it was beautiful for a good portion of today so I was able to get quite a bit done and I now have some nearly finished grave stones.

Let's back track to last weekend.  I had done a bunch of research online as to what was the best way to make grave decorations for our yard.  The pre-made ones you can get at a Halloween or craft store are too expensive, often to small, and usually made out of cheap-o materials.  I figured, hey, I'm crafty, why not try making my own.

Research began and wow!  There are so many talented people out there creating amazing graves and other Halloween decorations.  Mine won't even come close...but I did get a lot of great ideas and suggestions for materials.  I would have been lost without several sites...if you are ever interested in creating your own 'graveyard' I suggest you check out here, here, and here.  REALLY amazing stuff so check them out.

I started off easy and made my ghosts first.  Remember by inspiration...well here are how mine came out:

Maybe a teeny bit creepier..but I love the skulls showing through!

Next I tackled the pink foam and cut it into the basic shapes for my graves.  I didn't get enough pictures of the process...but after they were cut, I rounded edged and other details with a hotwire.

After that came the fun part...deciding what to write on them.  I came up with a few, printed them out and then transferred them to the 'stones' by tracing over them with pencil to leave an imprint that I then went over with Sharpie.

That was my weekend...during the week I worked on cutting out the letters.  I used a wood burner to create the outlines and then a dremel tool to carve in everything deeper.  It took some practice and they are by no means perfect, but here is the outcome:

 The lettering came out great...but they all still looked like pink pieces of foam.  I needed to sand them to round the edges so that they looked more stone-like.  I also had read on this site about 'warping' the stones using a flame.  You hold it close to the foam and it melts it a bit, giving the 'stones' a really aged look.

You can kind of see it in these pictures.  I also started painting the letters in.  Again, I need to be better about taking progress pictures:

Those spots that look dirty?  That is the warping...it doesn't look like much here, but it really added to the stones once I painted them.

And painting them was FUN.  I used gray latex paint...whatever was the cheapest I could find and I mixed sand into it so that the texture felt more stone-like.  Initially I thought I would use spray paint to have it go faster but apparently spray paint EATS foam!  Thank you internets for the warning.

So here is the nearly finished product.  I just need to paint the backs and add a bit more 'age' with some watered down green and black paint:

  

Sorry about the litter box in the background.  Once we set up the graveyard in the front yard, you will get to see them in their true glory! I'm really pleased with the outcome and have a few more lined up to be created...you can see I still have some foam left.

Happy Haunting!